DEFIANCE

Turnbull Motor Truck & Wagon Co.
Defiance Motor Truck Co.
Century Motor Truck Co.
Defiance, Ohio (c1914-1930)

Digby, Nova Scotia (mid-1920s-1930)

This is a Defiance radiator emblem (1922)   hatm
Size: Unknown 

The Turnbull Wagon Works was a major producer of wagons with a plant in Defiance, Ohio but suffered serious damage to their production due to flooding in 1913. It is reported that Turnbull decided to enter the motor truck business and, in the mid-teens, entered into a partnership with the Defiance Motor Truck Company, which was already a producer of motor trucks. The Turnbull Motor Truck & Wagon Company was then established.

The Turnbull Motor Truck & Wagon Company plant in Defiance, Ohio is shown in brochures and on company letterheads and was used to build the Defiance truck. The Turnbull Motor Truck & Wagon Company is named on Defiance truck advertisements to at least 1919. 

The Defiance Motor Truck Company was apparently reorganized in 1925 and became the Century Motor Truck Company. I have not found any examples of Defiance truck advertisements using either the Defiance Motor Truck Company or the Century Motor Truck Company name.

The Defiance was a conventional medium sized truck produced in 1-ton to 3-ton capacity models. Defiance also produced fire engine chassis and a bus chassis was also built in 1923 only. 

Defiance also had a Canadian assembly plant at Digby, Nova Scotia.

Further details about the Defiance truck are unavailable.

Emblem

The Defiance truck displayed the "Defiance" name on a painted cast iron radiator emblem, which on early models may have been cast directly into the radiator tank top, although I cannot confirm this, see examples shown below. 

The Defiance truck shown immediately below is believed to have been built in 1914 and is a very early example a Defiance truck.

Defiance motor truck (c1914 date unknown)   forums.aaca

The following 1918 Defiance trucks advertisement also appears to show a radiator emblem cast into the radiator tank top but, again, this cannot be confirmed with great confidence:

Defiance truck advert (1918)  ma

The following surviving 1922 Defiance Model D 1-1/2-ton truck has a painted cast iron emblem, which appears to be a separate cast emblem attached to the radiator tank top: 

Defiance Model D 1-1/2-ton truck (1922)     hatm

Defiance Model D truck showing radiator emblem (1922)  hatm

This is the painted cast iron Defiance radiator emblem shown at the top of this post. This Defiance radiator emblem is very rare.